"This is not AMD versus Intel," Stallard said. "Competition makes us a better company. It forces everyone to step up and deliver better solutions. It's not a situation where we have had a falling out with Intel."
Gartner analyst John Enck said during the conference that he believes there's a need in the market for 64-bit x86 systems, and "I don't see it as displacing [Intel's] Itanium or as a RISC-killing technology." The use of Opteron and 64-bit Xeons will be particularly useful in running "memory-hungry applications such as Microsoft Exchange," he said. Systems based on the processors should find a sweet spot in one- to four-way configurations, with those needing greater performance likely to turn to Itanium.
The Opteron processor, as well as the 64-bit-capable Xeon processors scheduled to begin shipping in the second quarter, have the ability to handle both traditional 32-bit x86 instructions and applications and 64-bit. In addition, the 64-bit-capable devices can address larger memories.
Although HP executives say they've been working on the Opteron for more than a year, HP follows both IBM and Sun in revealing its intent to provide systems using Opteron.
HP said it will provide performance benchmarks of systems using Opteron and the 64-bit Xeons as they're introduced.
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